Shofar FTP Archive File: imt/tgmwc/tgmwc-01/tgmwc-01-04.04

Archive/File: imt/tgmwc/tgmwc-01/tgmwc-01-04.04
Last-Modified: 1999/08/28
The Nazi Government officials provided the leadership in
preparing Germany for war. They received, however, the
enthusiastic co-operation of the German industrialists. The
role played by industrialists in converting Germany to a war
economy is an important one, and I turn briefly to that
aspect of the economic picture.
On the invitation of the defendant Goering, approximately
twenty-five of the leading industrialists of Germany, and
the defendant Schacht, attended a meeting in Berlin on the
20th day of February, 1933. This was shortly before the
election of 5th March, 1933, in Germany. At this meeting
Hitler announced the conspirators' aim to seize totalitarian
control over Germany, to destroy the parliamentary system,
to crush all opposition by force, and to restore the power
of the Wehrmacht.
Among those present on that day, in February of 1933 in
Berlin, were Gustav Krupp, head of the huge munitions firm,
Alfred Krupp, A.G.; four leading officials of I.G. Farben,
one of the world's largest chemical concerns; and, I repeat,
also present was the defendant Schacht. Albert Vogler, the
head of the huge steel trusts, the United Steel Works of
Germany, was there too, as were other leading
industrialists.
In support of the assertion with respect to that meeting at
that time and in that place, I refer your Honour to the
document EC-439, it being an affidavit of George von
Schnitzler, which reads as follows:-
"I, George von Schnitzler, a member of the Vorstand of
I.G. Farben, make the following deposition under oath:
At the end of February, 1933, four members of the
Vorstand of I.G. Farben, including Dr. Boech, the head
of the Vorstand, and myself were asked by the office of
the President of the Reichstag to attend a meeting in
his house, the purpose of which was not given. I do not
remember the two other
[Page 131]
colleagues of mine who were also invited. I believe the
invitation reached me during one of my business trips to
Berlin. I went to the meeting which was attended by
about twenty persons, who I believe were mostly leading
industrialists from the Ruhr.
Among those present, I remember:
Dr. Schacht, who at that time was not yet head of the
Reichsbank again and not yet Minister of Economics.
Krupp von Bohlen, who in the beginning of 1933 presided
over the Reichsverband der Deutschen Industrie, which
later on was changed in the semi-official Organisation
'Reichsgruppe Industrie.'
Dr. Albert Vogler, head of the Vereinigte Stahlwerke.
Von Loewenfeld, from an industrial works in Essen.
Dr. Stein who was head of the I.G. Farben owned mine -
Gewerkschaft Auguste Victoria - and also an active
member of the Deutsche Volkspartei.
I remember that Dr. Schacht acted as a kind of host.
While I had expected the appearance of Goering, Hitler
entered the room, shook hands with everybody and took a
seat at the table. In a long speech he talked mainly
about the danger of Communism over which he pretended
that he had just won a decisive victory.
He then talked about the Bundnis - alliance - into which
his party and the Deutschnationale Volkspartei had
entered. This latter party, in the mean-time, had been
reorganised by Herr von Papen. At the end he came to the
point which seemed to me the purpose of the meeting.
Hitler stressed the importance that the two
aforementioned parties should gain the majority in the
coming Reichstag election. Krupp von Bohlen thanked
Hitler for his speech. After Hitler had left the room,
Dr. Schacht proposed to the meeting the raising of an
election fund of, as far as I remember, RM3,000,000. The
fund should be distributed between the two ' allies'
according to their relative strength at the time being.
Dr. Stein suggested that the Deutsche Volkspartei should
be included- "
THE PRESIDENT: (interposing): Mr. Dodd, it seems to me that
really all that that document shows is that there was a
meeting at which Schacht was present, and at which it was
determined to subscribe an election fund in 1933.
MR. DODD: That is quite so, your Honour. I will not trouble
to read it all. There were some other references, but not of
major importance, in the last paragraph, to a division of
the election fund. I just call your Honour's attention to it
in passing.
I should like, at this point, to call your Honour's
attention to the document D-203, which is a three-page
document.
THE PRESIDENT: What is the number?
MR. DODD: D-203. I wish to read only excerpts from it very
briefly. It is the speech delivered to the industrialists by
Hitler, and I refer particularly to the second paragraph of
that document:-
"Private enterprise cannot be maintained in the age of
democracy;" .
THE PRESIDENT (interposing): What is the date of that?
MR. DODD: It is the speech made at the meeting on the 20th
February, 1933, at Berlin.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
MR. DODD:
"Private enterprise cannot be maintained in the age of
democracy; it is conceivable only if the people have a
sound idea of authority and personality."
I refer now to page 2 of the document, and I should like to
read an excerpt from the first paragraph on page 9, about
thirteen sentences down, beginning with the words: "I
recognised even while in the hospital that one had to search
for new ideas conducive to reconstruction. I found them in
Nationalism, in the value of strength and power of
individual personality."
[Page 132]
Then, a little further down, the next to the last and the
last sentence of that same paragraph, Hitler said:-
"If one rejects pacifism, one must put a new idea in its
place immediately. Everything must be pushed aside, must
be replaced by something better."
Then, in the third paragraph, the last sentence
beginning: "We must not forget that all the benefits Of
culture must be introduced more or less with an iron fist,
just as once upon a time the farmers were forced to plant
potatoes."
Then finally, on that page, in the fourth paragraph - nearly
at the end of it: "With the very same courage with which we
go to work to make up for what had been sinned during the
last fourteen years, we have withstood all attempts to move
us from the right way."
Then, at the top of the next page, in the second paragraph,
these words: "Now we stand before the last election.
Regardless of the outcome there will be no retreat, even if
the coming election does not bring about a decision."
THE PRESIDENT: Why did you not read the last line on page 2:
" While still gaining power, one should not start the
struggle against the opponent"?
MR. DODD: Beginning with the words "while still gaining
power"?
THE PRESIDENT: The sentence before, "We must first gain
complete power if we want to crush the other side
completely. While still gaining power, one should not start
the struggle against the opponent. Only when one knows that
one has reached the pinnacle of power, that there is no
further possible development, shall one strike."
MR. DODD: I was going to refer to that, if your Honour
pleases, in a minute.
However, I think it is quite proper to have it inserted
here.
Before starting to read this last paragraph, I suggest that
as it is now the accustomed time, as I understand it, and it
is a rather lengthy paragraph -
THE PRESIDENT (interposing): Yes, we will adjourn until two
o'clock.
Whereupon at 12.30 hours the Tribunal adjourned, to
reconvene at 14.oo hours of the same date.)
MR. DODD: If your Honour pleases, if I may go back for just
a very little bit to take up the train of thought where I
left off at the noon recess.
We were discussing document D-203, and I had referred
particularly to the third page of that document, and even
more particularly to the second paragraph on that page; and
I wish to read from a sentence approximately eight or ten
lines down in that second paragraph, which reads as follows:
"The question of restoration of the Wehrmacht will not
be decided at Geneva but in Germany, when we have gained
internal strength through internal peace."
I wish to refer again to the same page of the same document,
and to the last paragraph and the last sentence, which
refers to the defendant Goering, who was present at that
same meeting to which this document refers, the meeting of
20th February, 1933, in Berlin. Goering said:
"That the sacrifices asked for surely would be so much
easier for industry to bear if it realised that the election
Of 5th March will surely be the last one for the next ten
years, probably even for the next hundred years."
In a memorandum, dated the 22nd day of February, 1933, and,
for the information of the Court, in the document book,
bearing the number D-204, Gustav Krupp described this
meeting briefly, and in the memorandum wrote that he had
expressed to Hitler the gratitude of the twenty-five
industrialists present at the meeting on 20th February,
1933.
There were other expressions in that memorandum, which we do
not deem to be particularly pertinent to the allegations of
the Indictment with which we are now concerned.
I might point out to the Court that this memorandum,
together with the report
[Page 133]
of the speech of Hitler, were found by the British and the
United States Armies in the personal files of the defendant
Krupp.
I am aware, if your Honours please, that the method I am
pursuing here is a little tedious, because I am trying to
refer specifically to the documents, and particularly to the
excerpts referred to in my remarks, and therefore this
presentation differs very considerably from that which has
gone before. I trust, however, that you will bear with me,
because this part of the case requires some rather careful
and detailed explanations.
In April of 1933, after Hitler had entrenched himself in
power, Gustav Krupp, as Chairman of the Reich Association of
German Industry, which was the largest association of German
industrialists, submitted to Hitler the plan of that
association for the reorganisation of German industry, and
in connection therewith, undertook to bring the Association
into line with the aims of the conspirators, and to make it
an effective instrument for the execution of their policies.
In a letter of transmittal, Krupp stated that the plan of
reorganisation which he submitted on behalf of the
Association of Industrialists, was characterised by the
desire to co-ordinate economic measures and political
necessity, adopting the Fuehrer conception of the new German
State. A copy of that letter of transmittal is set out in
the document book under the number D-157.
In the plan of reorganisation itself, Krupp stated:
"The turn of political events is in line with the wishes
which I myself and the Board of Directors have cherished
for a long time. In reorganising the Reich Association
of German Industry, I shall be guided by the idea of
bringing the new organisation into agreement with the
political aims of the Reich Government."
The ideas expressed by Krupp on behalf of the members of the
Reich Association of German Industry for introducing the
leadership principle into industry, were subsequently
adopted.
I respectfully refer the Court to the Reichsgesetzblatt of
1934, Part I, 1194, Sections 11, 12 and 16.
Under the decrees introducing the leadership principle into
industry, each group of industry was required to have a
leader who was to serve without compensation. The leaders
were to be appointed and could be removed at the discretion
of the Minister of Economics. The charter of each group was
to be created by the leader, who was bound to lead his group
in accordance with the principles of the National Socialist
State.
I think it is fair to argue that the introduction of the
leadership principle into the organisations of business
permitted the centralisation of authority, and guaranteed
the efficient execution of orders, which the government
issued to business, in the interest of a promotion of a war
economy. And the overwhelming support given by the German
industrialists to the Nazi war programme is very vividly
described in a speech prepared by Gustav Krupp in January of
1944, for delivery at the University of Berlin; and I must
again respectfully refer your Honour to the document in your
book bearing the identification number D-317.
I shall not, of course, bore this court with a reading of
the whole document, but I should like to quote from it
without wrenching any of the material from its true context.
And this statement is found beginning in the third and
fourth paragraphs, being the first large paragraph on the
first page:
"War material is life-saving for one's own people, and
whoever works and performs in these spheres can be proud
of it. Here, enterprise, as a whole, finds its highest
justification of existence. This justification, I may
inject this here, crystallised especially during the
time of interregnum between 1919 and 1933, when Germany
was lying down disarmed."
[Page 134]
And further on:
"It is the one great merit of the entire German war
economy that it did not remain idle during those bad
years, even though its activity could not be brought to
light for obvious reasons. Through years of secret work,
scientific and basic groundwork was laid in order to be
ready again to work for the German Armed Forces at the
appointed hour without loss of time or experience."
And further quoting from that same speech, and the last
paragraph, particularly on the first page:
"Only through the secret activity of German enterprise,
together with the experience gained meanwhile through
production of peacetime goods, was it possible, after
1933, to fall into step with the new tasks arrived at,
restoring Germany's military power. Only through all
that could the entirely new and various problems,
brought up by the Fuehrer's Four-Year Plan for German
enterprise, be mastered. It was necessary to supply the
new raw materials, to explore and experiment, to invest
capital in order to make German economy independent and
strong - in short, to make it war-worthy."
Quoting even further from the same speech:-
"I think I may state here that the German enterprises
followed the new ways enthusiastically, that they made
the greatest intentions of the Fuehrer their own, by
fair competition and conscious gratitude, and became his
faithful followers. How else could the tasks between
1933 and 1939, and especially those after 1939, have
been overcome?"
It must be emphasised that the secret rearmament programme
was launched immediately upon the seizure of power by the
Nazi conspirators. On 4th April, 1933, the Reich Cabinet
passed a resolution establishing a Reich Defence Council.
The function of this council was secretly to mobilise for
war; and at the second meeting of the Working Committee of
the Councillors for Reich Defence, which was, by the way,
the predecessor of the Reich Defence Council, at that second
meeting which was held on 22nd May, 1933, the Chairman was
the defendant Keitel, then Colonel Keitel; and he stated
that the Reich Defence Council would immediately undertake
to prepare for war emergency. He stressed the urgency of the
task of organisms a war economy, and announced that the
Council stood ready to brush aside all @f their obstacles.
Fully aware of the fact that their action was in flagrant
violation of the Treaty of Versailles, the defendant Keitel
emphasised the extreme importance of absolute secrecy - I
quote from page 5, document EC-177 - when he said:-
"No document ought to be lost, since otherwise it may
fall into the hands of the enemies' Intelligence
Service. Orally transmitted, matters are not provable;
they can be denied by us in Geneva."
The singleness of purpose with which the Nazi conspirators
geared the German economy to the forging of a war machine is
even further shown by the secret minutes of the second
meeting of the Working Committee of the so-called Reich
Defence Council, held on the 7th of February, 1934, as shown
in the document EC-404, marked "Secret Command Matter," and
dated the 7th of February, 1934. At this meeting, Lieutenant-
General Beck pointed out that " The actual state of
preparation is the purpose of this session."
Parenthetically, I may say that on the first page of that
document it appears that besides Lieutenant-General Beck,
the defendant Jodl was present, then Lieutenant-Colonel
Jodl. There were also present a Captain Schmundt, a Colonel
Guderian, a Major-General von Reichenau and a Major
Warlimont. All these are names that your Honour will hear
more of in the course of the presentation of this case.

This site is intended for educational purposes to teach about the Holocaust and
to combat hatred.
Any statements or excerpts found on this site are for educational purposes only.

As part of these educational purposes, Nizkor may
include on this website materials, such as excerpts from the writings of racists and antisemites. Far from approving these writings, Nizkor condemns them and
provides them so that its readers can learn the nature and extent of hate and antisemitic discourse. Nizkor urges the readers of these pages to condemn racist
and hate speech in all of its forms and manifestations.